Lyceum of the Philippines University guns for a fourth straight victory, while Arellano University a fifth as the two collide today in the 94th NCAA senior basketball tournament at the Filoil Flying V Centre in San Juan City.
The Pirates have been rolling to start their campaign and picked up three straight victories, including a merciless 88-56 devastation of the Jose Rizal University Bombers Friday, while the Chiefs open up their season with a 75-69 overtime win over the Emilio Aguinaldo Generals Thursday.
Only one will remain unscathed though after their 12-noon encounter.
“We’ll try to treat our next games the same way we did in our first three, which is always to go hard for a win,” said LPU coach Topex Robinson, who swept the elimination round in 18 games last year before getting swept by San Beda in the finals in two games.
Mike Nzeusseu, Jaycee Marcelino and CJ Perez have been leading the way for the Pirates as they have averaged 17, 16.3 and 15.7 points, respectively, and the troika has no plans of slowing down.
For AU, it has shown that it is ready to move on minus its leader Kent Salado, who was sidelined the whole season because of an ACL (anterior cruciate ligament) injury he sustained early in the year, as Adrian Alban and Levi dela Cruz have come out to fill the void.
Alban fired 13 points, including big shots in regulation to help his team force OT, while Dela Cruz chipped in 12 including seven in extra time to power the Chiefs to victory.
Interestingly, this will be Alban’s first game against LPU, his former team before he transferred to AU two years ago.
San Beda, the reigning back-to-back champion, will likewise try to stay unbeaten as it tackles a dangerous St. Benilde at 4 p.m.
The Lions barely escaped past the Perpetual Help Altas, 67-65, on opening day last July 7 and never played since then as their scheduled games in the last two Tuesday playdates were both called off due to inclement weather.
San Beda is expected to be tested against a CSB team that is coming off a 90-79 win over the Mapua Cardinals Friday to nail the latter’s first win in two outings.
In the only other seniors’ game, San Sebastian (1-1) and JRU (0-2) take on each other at 2 p.m.